Document Type : Research

Authors

• Vahideh Abolhasani ¹
• Arefe Damansouz ²

¹ Department of foreign languages, faculty of literature and humanities. Shahid Bahonar University of Kerman

² department of foreign languages, Faculty of literature and humanities, Shahid Bahonar University of Kerman

Abstract

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a kind of social communication disorder that repetitive behaviors/stereotyped interests and impairment in social interaction and communication are some of its characteristics. The present study is designed to investigate the acoustic behavior of vowels in stressed/unstressed positions and males/females in Persian language in children with autism. For this purpose, a minimal pair word [tɒbeʃ] (light)/ [tɒb-'eʃ] (his/her swing) was selected and 15 children with autism and 15 typical development (TD) children (five girls and ten boys) were asked to repeat them for two times. Data were recorded by a Shure microphone. Then a Text Grid was made for each word and the amount of fundamental frequency (F0), two first formants (F1, F2), duration, and intensity vowels [ɒ] and [e] were measured by PRAAT software and analyzed by SPSS software. Eventually results demonstrated that DISABILITY has a significant effect on F0 and duration of vowels [ɒ, e] and F1, F2, and intensity of vowel [e]. Moreover, GENDER has a significant effect on F2 of vowel [e]. Results also indicated that the impact of STRESS on F0 of vowel [e] and duration of vowel [ɒ] is noticeable. The interaction between two factors ''DISABILITY STRESS'' showed that mean F0 of vowel [e] and duration of vowel [ɒ] in ASD children in stressed and unstressed position is more than that in TD ones. Therefore, fundamental frequency and duration of vowels have a great effect to judge about the position of the stress in both ASD children and TD children.

Keywords

• autism
• intensity
• duration
• formant

Main Subjects

• Phonetics and Phonology